It is very difficult to realize in these days of refinement and of comparative luxury, even in the homes of the working classes, what the table appointments must have been in early English homes. Sometimes glowing accounts are given of the feasting of olden time; but no doubt many of the great occasions contrasted in their luxurious magnificence with the usual mode of living. They were, however, the days of feeding rather than of refinement in partaking of the sumptuous feast. The table appointments on such occasions were crude and simple, and they were altogether absent from the tables of the lower classes. It is difficult, indeed, to realize that the conditions under which people lived in mediÆval England, in the days when the baron and his followers assembled in the great hall, and with his chosen companions sat above the salt, satisfied men of wealth; it was, however, in accord with the spirit of the age.

The primitive methods of serving up food and eating it observed by the majority of people then would be looked upon with disgust nowadays by every one. The table appointments were not only very few, but those which were used, like the knife and spoon, were often brought into the feasting hall by those who were to use them. The polished oaken board was often laden with rough and readily prepared dishes, the result of some fortunate expedition or of a prosperous hunt. The knife was the chief implement used until comparatively recent days, for forks are quite a modern innovation. The spoon, it is true, goes back to hoary antiquity, but in England, even in the Middle Ages, spoons were used chiefly for ecclesiastical purposes. In Harrison's Elizabethan England we read that the times had changed, for instead of "treen platters" there were pewter plates, and tin or silver spoons instead of wood.

Cutlery: Knives, Forks, and Spoons.

The term "cutlery," derived from coutellerie, the French for cutlery, had been evolved from culter, the Latin for knife. Primarily it referred to cutting instruments, and especially to knives, but in a general way, when speaking of table cutlery, spoons and forks may appropriately be included. Early records referring to cutlery indiscriminately use the terms knives and swords; indeed, the arms granted to the London Cutlers' Company in the sixteenth year of the reign of Edward IV are two swords, crossed; later a crest, consisting of an elephant bearing a castle, was added. Homer tells us of knives carried at the girdle in his day, and describes them as of triangular form. The Anglo-Saxons and the Normans carried about with them met-soex or eating knives, but it was not until the end of the fifteenth century that knives were used at table, other than those which were carried at the girdle, every man using his own cutlery. In England, Sheffield was early noted for the manufacture of knives, for Chaucer tells us, "A Scheffeld thwitel bare he in his hose." Another form of spelling the word which denoted knife was troytel, and from these terms is derived "whittle." The jack knife came in in the days of James I, after whom it was named, the original term being Jacques-te-leg, these knives shutting into a groove or handle without spring or lock.

The making of a table knife even in early times necessitated the work of many hands, for taking part in its production were the smiths who forged it, the bladers who made the blade out of the metal already hammered, and the haft-makers. When the knife was complete it was handed to the sheath-makers, who fashioned the sheath of leather, and sometimes encased it in metal. The host did not provide table cutlery for his guests until the reign of Elizabeth. In earlier times it was left to the traveller to provide himself with whatever he deemed necessary; thus it is recorded that when Henry VI made a tour in the north he carried with him knife, fork, and spoon, as it was stated "he scarcely expected to find any at the houses of the nobility." From that custom, no doubt, arose the common practice of fitting separate sets, and afterwards sets for more than one person, in cases, the materials used being for many years the beautifully embossed cuir boulli leather work. Queen Elizabeth carried her knife and other appointments at her girdle, a custom followed by her ladies; although it is said that at the Court of the virgin queen it was customary for the gentlemen courtiers to cut up the meat on the platters of the fair ones with whom they were dining; the ladies at that time being content to prove the truth of the adage, "Fingers were made before forks."

Collectors soon realize that there were many forms of knives even amongst those specially reserved for table use. Both blades and handles have passed through many stages in the gradual evolution from the hunting knife to the cutlery on the modern dinner table. The blades have been narrow and pointed like daggers, and they have been scimitar-shaped, and rounded off at the point. The qualities of the material have changed, too, Sheffield cutlers and those of other places vying with one another. The cutlery trade has long drifted north, although at one time the members of the London Cutlers' Company were proud of the quality of their goods, and boasted of their knives being "London made, haft and blade." This ancient Guild tried hard to maintain their pre-eminence, and in the days of Elizabeth obtained a Charter prohibiting all strangers from bringing any knives into England from beyond the seas.

The carving knife seems to have had a separate descent from the large hunting knives used to cut up barons of beef, roasted oxen, and portions which were cut off the joint for each individual or for several persons.

Forks for table use were a much later invention, although there were larger meat forks, flesh forks, and heavier iron kitchen appliances (see Chapter V).

In very early times small forks, of which there are some in the Guildhall Museum dating from Roman and Saxon times, were chiefly used for fruit. The use of forks at table, for meat, is attributed to the invention of an Italian, and the custom thus started rapidly spread "in good society" on the Continent of Europe. Thomas Coryate, a noted traveller, is said to have introduced them into Germany, and afterwards into England, where their use was at first much ridiculed as effeminate, the "fork-carving" traveller being spoken of in contempt.

Forks were in regular use in England early in the sixteenth century. Dean Stanley, in his Memorials of Westminster Abbey, quotes from the Chapter Book of 1554, in which it is stated by Dean Weston (1553-6) that the College dinners "became somewhat disorderly, forks and knives were tossed freely to and fro." The old table forks were two-pronged, the prongs being long and set near together; the steel forks of the early nineteenth century were three-pronged, and another prong was added later, the latter form being adapted by the makers of silver forks in more recent years.

In Fig. 18 is shown a very handsome knife case and its contents, which are to be seen in the Victoria and Albert Museum. In Fig. 19 another example of a set of knife, fork, and spoon in the same collection is illustrated.

The spoon is, like the knife, of great antiquity. It is said to have been suggested by shells on the shore, and by the hollow of the hand which in the most primitive days was used to drink with. The most beautiful old spoons are those made of silver, a magnificent pair being shown in Fig. 20. Many such spoons are now almost priceless, especially the much-valued Apostle spoons, often given in olden time as christening gifts. Silver spoons more correctly belong to antique silver, which forms another branch of curio-collecting.

Of spoons there are many made of other materials than silver, some being carved in wood (see Chapter XIII), others of ivory, and some of bone. Many of the older spoons were made of brass or latten; but when silver became popular table spoons of silver were procured whenever it was possible to afford them, and a collection including in the varieties the Apostle and the seal top, and its various developments from the rat-tail to the fiddle, is obtainable. As regarding spoons Westman has written: "The spoon is one of the first things wanted when we come into the world, and it is one of the last things we part with before we go out."

The collector revels in the beautifully engraved blades of the rarer curios; in the handles so varied in their materials and ornament; and in the cases in which knives, forks, and spoons have in many instances been preserved. From the curios in museums and from family treasures it is evident that much of the cutlery has been presented as donations to the housekeeping outfit of a newly-married couple, or given as presentation sets or pieces on some special occasion; just as cutlery is often chosen for presentation purposes to-day.

From the sixteenth century onwards such sets have been made and presented. The recently arranged cutlery room in the Victoria and Albert Museum at South Kensington, that great art treasure-house of the nation, contains an exceptionally representative collection. In some instances the examples are only single specimens which may have been presented separately, or they may have formed part of a more complete set. There are sets of carving knives with long blades, forks with double prongs, and broad-pointed flat-bladed servers, many of them etched and engraved all over. Even after carvers were regular features on the table the small knives and forks were brought by the guests who were bidden to the feast, for it must be remembered that it was not until 1670 that Prince Rupert brought the first complete set of forks to this country.

In the Victoria and Albert Museum there is a very beautiful little knife, the handle of which is delicately carved, the group which constitutes the design representing our first parents standing beneath the Tree of Knowledge, in the midst of which the wily serpent is cunningly concealed.

Another pair consisting of a very handsome knife and fork have handles representing animals and grotesque figures. These were the work of Dutch artists in the seventeenth century; but curiously enough the quaint leather case in which this knife and fork are enclosed was evidently of earlier date, for it has upon it "1598." Some of the cases of leather made by the cuir boulli process are circular, there being separate holes for each of the knives they were intended to contain. Some of the knives are very curious, especially those with wooden or horn handles of sixteenth and early seventeenth-century make, which have been found in considerable numbers in Moorfields and Finsbury, along with sharpening steels. The ordinary table knives of a little later date, when they were sold in half-dozens and dozens along with two-pronged forks, were decorative, their handles being made of materials varying in quality and in the excellence of their manufacture. One of the most beautiful sets of rare historic value now on view in the Victoria and Albert Museum is part of a set of fourteen, the ivory handles being carved to represent the kings and queens of England. These rare examples of the English cutler's and ivory carver's art, dated 1607, have blades damascened with gold. There are knives also with handles of amber, one very remarkable set in amber over foil being decorated with the figure of Christ and His Apostles on one side of the handles, and on the other side there is the Apostles' Creed.

Among other materials used in the manufacture of handles for knives and forks, some of the latter having two prongs and others three, chiefly made in the eighteenth century, are: Battersea enamel on copper, Staffordshire agate ware, Meissen porcelain, Venetian millefiore glass, Bow porcelain, jasper, Venetian aventurine glass, enamelled earthenware, and Chantilly porcelain. In many instances these handles made of such beautiful materials are further decorated by miniature painted scenes and floral ornaments. Another favourite material is bone, some of the older handles being stained, mostly green, afterwards decorated with applied silver in floral and geometrical designs. There are a few maple-wood handles of the eighteenth century, and others of stag's horn and of shagreen.

The knife box with its divisions, referred to elsewhere, is exemplified in many remarkably fine cases to be seen in our museums and in isolated specimens in private collections.

The interest in a collection of household utensils is greatly enhanced by the halo of romance which surrounds the uses of some of them. This is seen and understood by the collector of cutlery perhaps more than of anything else, for many old customs have been associated with the giving of cutlery, and superstitious beliefs have crept in.

The gift of cutlery at weddings was not always the prosaic thing it is nowadays, for the cases and even the knives were often accompanied by some sentimental rhyme or poetic inscription. Two knives, apparently the gift of bride and bridegroom to one another, now in the British Museum, are engraved with separate inscriptions. One reads:—

while on the other is engraved:—

The early uses of knives in association with religious rites are interesting, as, for instance, the golden knife with which the old Druids cut the mistletoe with pomp and much mystic ceremony. The early Christians made use of the knife and symbolized the cross when feasting; indeed, the old country habit—which is now deemed a sign of vulgarity—of crossing the knife and fork after dining, took its origin in that act of devotion, for together they form the Greek cross. Browning refers to the custom when he says:—

In Russia this custom of the peasantry was deep-rooted; and there they were careful to take up the knife and fork and lay them down on the plate crossed before commencing their often meagre meal.

Strange to say that although knives and forks have been crossed in reverence, to cross knives has been deemed unlucky, and to present a maiden with a pair of scissors—two crossed blades—has long been held by those who believe in such signs as unlucky. To give a knife is to "cut luck"—so the legend runs; hence so many when presenting a pocket knife will demand a penny (as the smallest coin when silver pennies were in circulation) in return. The Rev. Samuel Bishop, M.A., Master of the Merchant Taylors' School in 1795, wrote the following lines on the subject of presenting a knife to his wife:—

Salt Cellars.

The condiments of the table were usually supplied in separate vessels. The use of salt with meat goes back to primitive times, although we have few records of the vessels in which it was served. The Arab chief offers his guest salt as an act of friendship, and as such it is partaken of. The classic Ancients consecrated salt before using it, and the salt cellar was placed upon the table together with the first fruits "for the gods," those to whom they were offered being generally Hercules or Mercury. The Greek salt cellars were shaped like bowls, and as the salt became an important feature as a dividing line between rich and poor, the size of the cellar grew. To realize the importance of the salt cellar in mediÆval England, we have only to visit the Tower of London, where the great salt cellars of State are kept. The large standing salt was the dividing line upon the table. Salt cellars dating from the fourteenth century are in existence, and many curiously shaped designs intervened before the bell-shaped salts which were fashionable in the days of Elizabeth and the trencher salts of Queen Anne and the early Georges. Salt cellars with feet came into fashion in the reign of George II; then followed many minor changes until the beautifully perforated salt cellars with blue liners bearing hall-marks dating from the close of the eighteenth century came into vogue. It is from among the Georgian table appointments that collectors gather most of their specimens. The materials of which these salt cellars were made vary; there are sterling silver, antique pewter, and Sheffield plate; and there are salt cellars of china and porcelain which may well be included in a collection of table curios.

Cruet Stands.

The separate bottles or cruets, casters, mustard pots, and very rarely salts, were gradually gathered together and placed in a frame which grew big in late Georgian and early Victorian days. For convenience the stand was placed in the centre of the table, and often made to revolve. Such cruets are met with in silver and other metals, also in papier-machÉ, often ornamented with mother-o'-pearl and painted flowers. The greatest interest, however, is found in collecting separate bottles, such as those charming Bristol glass cruets, ornamented with flowers and lettered with the names of their contents, such as "VINEGAR," "SALAD OIL," "MUSTARD," "PEPPER."

There is a greater variety of form in the metal cruets and casters, which followed the prevailing styles silversmiths were then employing. Especially graceful are the old pepperettes and vase-shaped casters. The woodturner, too, contributed to the table appointments of the eighteenth century, and the carver made some curious and even grotesque figures, the heads of which took off, and thus formed pepper casters. One of the most noted grotesque sets reminds us of the Toby fill-pot jugs in form, a complete set consisting of two salts, two mustards, and two pepper pots. Genuine specimens are very difficult to meet with now, although those Staffordshire cruets have been reproduced, and are offered either singly or in sets; but the difference between the genuine antique and the modern replica ought not to deceive even an amateur.

There are varieties of mustard pots, which were in turn round, oval, square, hexagonal, and cylindrical, some being like miniature well buckets with perforated sides and blue metal liners.

Punch and Toddy.

A hundred years ago the punch bowl was inseparable from the convivial feast. It was a favourite sideboard ornament, and found in frequent use on the dining table, round which smokers and card players drew up and filled their glasses with punch and toddy. Ladles were indispensable, and were varied in form and in the materials of which they were composed. Punch ladles were in earlier days made of cherry-wood, mounted with a silver rim and fitted with a long handle, often made of twisted horn. The horn, which was somewhat pliable, was secured to the bowl by a silver socket. Other ladles were made entirely of silver, some having a current coin of the realm, a guinea preferably, fixed in the bottom of the bowl—for luck. Some of the ladles were beautifully decorated in repousse, others were shaped like sauce boats; there were ladles without lips, others deep like the porringers, and yet others were quite round like a drinking bowl. Some are family heirlooms, others have been purchased in curio shops, and unfortunately during the last few years so great has been the demand for them that many modern copies have been palmed off as genuine antiques. The hall-mark on the rim is in many instances a guarantee of age, although some of the genuine specimens do not appear to have been hall-marked at all. The fact that an old coin is found fixed within the bowl is no criterion of antiquity, and does not always indicate that the punch ladle itself is contemporary with the coin, for old coins are common enough and readily fixed in new ladles.

Collectors of old china simply revel in punch bowls. Punch was at the height of its popularity when most of the domestic porcelain and decorative china, now rare and valuable, was being made. The best known potters in Worcester, Derby, Bristol, Liverpool, and the Potteries made punch bowls, some ornamented with their characteristic decorations; others were specially emblematical, such, for instance, as the bowls covered with masonic signs; some were nautical in design, and many were enriched with coats of arms and crests. Several of the punch bowls belonging to the old City Companies are on view in the Guildhall Museum, and isolated specimens are seen to be in other places.

Oriental china was at that time being imported into this country very extensively, and some remarkably delicate bowls, contrasting with Mason's strong ironstone, are obtainable. These bowls, ladles, and the charming little egg-shaped boxes which formerly contained a nutmeg and a tiny grater are household table furnishings of exceptional interest. It may interest some to learn that punch, which came into vogue in the seventeenth century, derived its name from a Hindustani word signifying five, indicative of the five ingredients of which it was composed—spirit, water, sugar, lemon, and spice.

Porringers and Cups.

Although sterling silver and other materials from which drinking vessels are usually made have been exhaustively dealt with in other volumes of the "Chats" series, as table appointments drinking cups must be referred to here. Caudle cups were in use in the sixteenth century, and throughout the century that followed they were used along with porringers, which differed from them only in that the mouths of the porringers were wider and the sides straight. The caudle cup, sometimes called a posset cup, is met with both without and with cover, and in some instances it is accompanied by a stand or tray. Caudle or posset was a drink consisting of milk curdled with wine, and in the days when it was drunk few went to bed without a cup of smoking hot posset. Many of the early cups were beautifully embossed and florally ornamented, although others were quite plain, with the exception of an engraved shield, on which was a coat of arms, crest, or monogram. Many of the porringers which followed the earlier type were octagonal, and in some instances twelve-sided. In the reign of William and Mary the rage for Chinese figures and ornaments caused English silversmiths to decorate porringers with similar designs. The style which prevailed the longest was that known as "Queen Anne," much copied in modern replicas. Very pleasing, too, are eighteenth-century miniature porringers.

There is much to please in the work of the silversmith and potter, as well as the glass blower, in the cups they fashioned; and the artist admires the chased engraving or the rich colouring, and perchance the etching and cutting of the cup. Some, however, show preference for the earlier cups and drinking vessels of commoner materials, and for those eccentricities of the table found in curious hunting cups, vessels which had to be emptied at a draught, or to be drunk under the most difficult conditions like the puzzle cups of Staffordshire make. The peg tankards of ancient date, a very fine example originally belonging to the Abbey of Glastonbury, afterwards in the possession of Lord Arundel of Wardour, held two quarts, the pegs dividing its contents into half-pints according to the Winchester standard. On that remarkable cup the twelve Apostles were carved round the sides, and on the lid was the scene at the Crucifixion.

It is said that the pegs were first ordered by Edgar, the Saxon king, to prevent excessive drinking, the tankard being passed round, every man being expected to drink down to the next peg. Heywood, in his Philocathonista, says: "Of drinking cups, divers and sundry sorts we have, some of elm, some of box, and some of maple and holly." According to the quaint spelling of those days there were then in use in Merrie England: "Mazers, noqqins, whiskins, piggins, cringes, ale-bowls, wassel bowls, tankard and kames from a pottle to a pint and from a pint to a gill." The leather cups and tankards or black jacks (see Chapter VIII) were mostly used in country places by "shepheards and harvesters." A writer in a work published in the early years of the nineteenth century says: "Besides metal and wood and pottery we have cups of hornes of beasts, of cocker nuts, of goords, of eggs of ostriches, and of the shells of divers fishes."

A simple cocoanut, mounted in silver and made into a cup, perhaps a century or more ago, is by no means to be despised. Some are beautifully polished and ornamented with incised work. Contemporary with the earlier specimens are pots made of ostrich eggs, mounted in silver, regarded of great value in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Some of the university colleges possess fine examples, and there are many in the hands of London silversmiths. Figs. 23 and 24 represent two cocoanut cups with feet of silver, one engraved with the owner's initials, the foot being decorated with bead ornament. Fig. 25 is a cocoanut mounted as a flagon with handle of whalebone and rim and foot of silver. The use of such cups seems to have been very generally distributed all over the world, for there are many South American examples, as well as the English varieties. The gourd, too, was used for similar purposes; the Mexicans made such bowls and cups, finishing them off with silver mounts and sometimes adding silver feet. There are French flasks made of small gourds, sometimes scent flasks being made in the same way, not infrequently decorated with incised inlays of coloured composition on a black ground. Some of the English silversmiths engraved hunting scenes on small flasks made of the rind of a gourd, choosing hunting scenes and birds and familiar outdoor objects.

In Figs. 21 and 21A are shown two curious old wood drinking cups, and Fig. 22 represents a wooden jug bound with copper.

Horn was a favourite material for cups, sometimes surmounted by elaborate covers and feet of silver. One of the rarest drinking horns, now in Queen's College, Oxford, was presented to the College by the Queen of Edward III in 1340. Of later types there are beakers and tumbler cups, the latter rounded at the base so that they were easily upset, the idea being that they must be emptied at the first draught. From these cups sprang the quaint hunting cups in porcelain, modelled in the form of a hare's head, or like a fox, some of the scarcest being evidently modelled for the fisherman's use, to take the form of a fish's head.

The very remarkable drinking cup shown in Fig. 27 is made of walnut; the ridges, carved in deep relief, stand out boldly, each one being carved, the letters forming a complete metaphor, to which is added the name of its original owner, the inscription reading as follows:—

"TAKE . NOT . FROM . ME .
AL . MY . STOR . AXCP . YE .
FILL . ME . VEE . SVME . MOR .
FOR . AV . TO . BORROV .
AND . NEVER . TO . PAY .
I . CALL . THAT .
FOVLL . PLAY .
IoN WATSON 1695."

Trays and Waiters.

In olden time not very far from the dining table stood the cupboard or buffet from which evolved the sideboard. On it were displayed the cups and flagons and table appointments not actually in use. It is true the servants carried the great dishes from the kitchen, and removed the lesser vessels on trays and "waiters," and it is such trays, especially those in silver and Sheffield plate used in the last century, which are now valuable. The waiter or serving man or woman has been an essential feature in domestic service from the earliest times, for the history of society invariably records those who wait at table:—

It is an easy remove from the waiter to the tray or vessel on which the waiters carried the things they served up to those on whom they waited. The name "salver," commonly applied to a tray or waiter, seems to have originated from the old custom of tasting meats before they were served, to salve or save their employers from harm. Among the more valuable are the trays or waiters of silver and Sheffield plate. Trays made of iron and japanned after the fashion of Japanese metal lacquer wares, which towards the close of the eighteenth century were so largely imported into this country, are often neglected, yet many of them are truly antiquarian and by no means unlovely.

One of the chief seats of the industry was at Pontypool, but the business drifted to Birmingham. It was when the japan wares, so called from the attempt of the makers to copy the lacquers of Japan then much imported, were being successfully made amidst surroundings then exceedingly romantic in the little town singularly situated on a steep cliff overhanging the Avon Llwyd, that dealers found trays, breadbaskets, snuffer trays, knife trays, caddies, and urns much in request. In Bishopsgate Street Without, in London, there is a noted wine house known as the "Dirty Dick." This curious title was derived from the owner of a famous hardware store who kept it, and was dubbed "Dirty Dick" because of his untidy shop. The wild disorder of the establishment gave rise to a popular ballad of which the following are two of the first lines:—

In addition to japanned wares there are trays of paper pulp ornamented with mother-o'-pearl and richly decorated with gold.

The Tea Table.

The modern tea table presents a much less formal array of china and good things than that of a generation or two back when high tea was an important function, and the good wife of the household loaded her table with many substantial dishes. The best china was taken from the cupboard, and family heirlooms in silver were arrayed on either side of the teapot. Needless to say the teapot was an indispensable adjunct, and some of the teapots belonging to the old sets are massive and gorgeous, rather than beautiful, although the earlier teapots made in this country in the eighteenth century, a time when tea was expensive and a real luxury, were quite small.

There are many curiosities, too—such, for instance, as the Chinese teapots of the Ming period, when the potters seem to have vied with one another in producing grotesque forms, and from china clay fashioned objects which typified their mythological beliefs. Some of these teapots took the form of curious sea-horses represented as swimming in waves of green and amidst seaweed. Some of these fabulous beasts are spotted over with splashes of colour, and others have curious twig-like formations upon their sides, said to denote pieces of coral and water plants from the ocean. The teapot was at one time most frequently filled from the pretty little oval copper or brass kettle on the hob, or from a swing kettle on a stand on the table. The table kettle was generally heated by a spirit lamp which kept the water boiling ready for use. Of later years silver table appointments of early eighteenth-century make have become very scarce, and the curio value of the larger pieces has steadily risen. It would seem as if the maximum figure had been reached for silver of that period, for at the sale of the Fitzhenry collection a plain kettle and stand, an example of Ambrose Stevenson's work in 1717, realized £697.

Cream Jugs.

The cream jug included in the tea and coffee sets of silver or metal, and in the tea china of which so many beautiful sets are still extant, has almost an independent position in connection with table appointments, for ever since tea drinking became general it was regarded as a necessity, and was made in accord with the then prevailing styles. It is almost the commonest collectable antique in this particular group. In silver it was always hall-marked, and its date can, therefore, be fixed. Briefly outlining the development of its form, it may be mentioned that it was quite plain in the reign of Queen Anne, when tea drinking came into fashion. When George I came to the throne it was widened somewhat and made a little shorter. At that time the silver cream jugs were hammered into shape out of a flat sheet, there being no seam; after the body was formed a rim was added and a lip put on. There was a deeper rim in the reign of George II, and then feet took the place of rims.

Gradually Chippendale carving and the shaped legs of the furniture then being used were reflected even in the cream jug, the lip in those days being hammered out of the body of the vessel with a graceful curve. Rims again took the place of feet in the reign of George III, and the tall legged cream jug came into vogue. The body was decorated with repousse work or engraved, and the shape gradually changed until the familiar helmet-shaped cream jug resulted. The helmet cream jugs were beautifully engraved with ribbon and wreath decoration, and frequently there was a beaded pattern round the rim and the handle. The same styles prevailed both in Sheffield plate and in Britannia metal, often misnamed pewter. The decoration on the china cream jugs was frequently floral, but in those made in the leading potteries there was a distinct following of the public style.

Sugar Tongs and Nippers.

With the use of lump sugar late in the eighteenth century sugar tongs were added to the table appointments, and their decoration and ornament usually followed that of teaspoons. They were sometimes engraved with the crests or initials of the owners, and occasionally, in the case of wedding presents, with the initials of both the master and mistress of the household, one being placed inside the sugar tongs and the other on the arch outside. In connection with the cutting of lump sugar steel sugar nippers were much used in the kitchen before lump sugar was bought from the grocer ready cut up. These nippers, some of the earlier ones being chased and engraved, have now passed into the region of household curios.

Caddies.

As the tea table would be incomplete without the beverage brewed from tea-leaves it follows as a natural sequence that the housewife has always required a storebox for her supply, and in some cases one in which she could keep under lock and key more than one variety. When tea was first imported into this country it was sent over from China in a kati, a small wooden box holding about 1-1/3 lb.; hence the name passed on to the more elaborate receptacles on the sideboard containing the household supply. These boxes were mostly fashioned in accord with the furniture, many having the well-known Sheraton shell design on the lid, or on the front of the box. Some are square-sided, others tapered, generally finished with beautiful little brass caddy balls as feet, and often with brass ring handles and ornaments. The inside of the caddy was divided into two compartments, usually boxes lined with lead or lead paper, and frequently a central compartment for a sugar bowl was added. In nearly all the better boxes there was provision for the silver caddy spoon with which to apportion the accustomed supply.

Chelsea and Bow Cupids.

Those curious little boy figures known as Chelsea and Bow Cupids are for the most part classed with ornaments, but they more appropriately belong to table appointments, for in olden time when the cloth had been removed these curious little figures were placed upon the mahogany or oaken board along with the dessert, as if to guard the fruit and the wine. The Cupids are garlanded with flowers, baskets of which they have in their hands—delightful little figures when genuine antiques. They vary in size and are said to have been divided in the past as "small" and "large" boys.

Nutcrackers.

Many a famous joke has been cracked over the "walnuts and wine." It was when the board was cleared of the viands that the nuts and fruit were partaken of. The edible nuts mostly favoured before foreign supplies came into the market were the hazel, walnut, chestnut, and the famous Kent filberts. Although doubtless supplemented by any objects handy, the primitive method of cracking nuts with the teeth was generally practised by the common people. What more natural than for the early inventor to see in the human head the "box" in which to place his mechanical device and to give power and leverage by utilizing the legs of the man he had carved in wood. In the Middle Ages some remarkable carvings were produced, mostly working on the same lines as the earliest forms. In the seventeenth century, when metal crackers came into vogue, pressure was applied by means of a screw, and the contemporary wood crackers were designed on that principle. Afterwards the older type of cracker was revived, both in wood and metal; subsequently the simpler form at present in use was adopted.

Here and there in museums and among domestic relics odd pairs of these old crackers are discovered. The interest in them, however, grows when several early examples are placed side by side. There are a few instances of specialized collections, and through the courtesy of Mr. Charles Evans, of Nailsea Court, who possesses a unique collection of all periods, we are able to illustrate a variety of forms. Fig. 31 represents a very early pair of nutcrackers, probably made in the fourteenth century; the one shown in Fig. 34 has the Elizabethan ruff round the neck of the carved head; and Figs. 28, 29, and 30 represent the screw period, Fig. 28 being an early example. One of the finest pieces in the collection is Fig. 29, a cracker in the form of a hooded monk; Fig. 30 being a charming bit of wood-carving in walnut wood, a somewhat grotesque figure representing an old fiddler. Fig. 33 is a curious cracker combining a useful pick almost in the form of the bill of a bird, Fig. 32 being of similar date. The next group shows the evolution from the metal screw to the more ordinary types, Figs. 36 and 38 being screw nutcrackers; 35, 37, and 39 being quaint examples of early metal nutcrackers modelled on more modern form. Such curios are extremely interesting, and whether exhibited as specimens of carving or of metal work, or used as table ornaments combining utility and antiquarian interest, they are well worth securing.

Turned Woodware.

Table appointments have afforded amateur wood-turners and carvers opportunities of showing their skill. Even before the days of modern lathes with eccentric chucks and other improvements, turners were very clever in producing little articles for table use, and in their making expended a wealth of skill and time. Among these were pepper boxes and wooden salt cellars, and carved wooden spoons, especially salad servers, which are even still made and delicately carved, the Swiss peasants being famous for such work. One of the village occupations during winter evenings in years gone by was to make wooden objects, although most of their efforts were directed in other ways than table appointments (see Chapter XIII, Fig. 85).

On the Sideboard.

Not far removed from the dining table is the sideboard or buffet, so important a piece of furniture in the dining hall, for on it were formerly displayed table appointments and emblems of the feast. The urn-shaped knife boxes which were so often placed on either side were chiefly of mahogany, sometimes inlaid with satinwood and often with those rare shell-like ornaments which became so popular in the days of Chippendale and Sheraton. The compartments in which were placed the table knives prevented either blades or handles from being rubbed. Copper and metal urns were frequently conspicuous on the sideboard, although many of the small tables so much treasured now as antiques in the drawing-room were originally made for urns to stand upon.

There are many beautiful curios of the home made of wood, among them being such rare gems as wood screens and the frames of hand screens, some of which screwed on to the ends of the mantelpieces with small clamps.

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